I do ippon and morote. I like morote better, because I don't lose the grip nearly as often, or going under the collar grip (is that morote, also?). I lose my ippon grip at least 50% of the time against good players.

Last night, we had a competition practice, and I was doing really, really well with seoi otoshi. A few ippon seoi, a few morote, and one ridiculously (I was surprised) beautiful sode grip, against a very, very good fellow nikkyu who should be a black belt. For whatever that counts or matters.

For an hour before practice, I did standing seoi uchikomi as fast as I could muster, and really concentrated on economy of movement. One thing that I noticed that all of us were doing was sort-of hopping backwards into both seoi nage and most goshi waza. When we eliminated the back "hop", the speed of the throwing easily tripled or quadrupled. Then, during comp practice, Ori had us get into the drop position and force the throw from the knees, with uke resisting 100%.

I do ippon and morote. I like morote better, because I don't lose the grip nearly as often, or going under the collar grip (is that morote, also?). I lose my ippon grip at least 50% of the time against good players.

Last night, we had a competition practice, and I was doing really, really well with seoi otoshi. A few ippon seoi, a few morote, and one ridiculously (I was surprised) beautiful sode grip, against a very, very good fellow nikkyu who should be a black belt. For whatever that counts or matters.

For an hour before practice, I did standing seoi uchikomi as fast as I could muster, and really concentrated on economy of movement. One thing that I noticed that all of us were doing was sort-of hopping backwards into both seoi nage and most goshi waza. When we eliminated the back "hop", the speed of the throwing easily tripled or quadrupled. Then, during comp practice, Ori had us get into the drop position and force the throw from the knees, with uke resisting 100%.

Overall good results.

As far as I know, Ippon Seoi Nage hooks your arm in uke armpit across their body. If you do some sort of near side hook under from the outside (of uke collar grip), I would call it Ippon Seoi nage. Technically, Seoi Nage with no modifier is what is called Morote Seoinage (both hands seoi nage). You have henka (variations) like Kata Eri (same side lapel grip).

Congrats on the success in practice. It's important to stay relaxed when doing uchikomi, you may have figured that out already. You have to take the tension out of your body where you don't need it. That tension will slow you down.

The other issue is angles. If you do uchikomi only with uke standing square to you, you are basically taking a shortcut that assumes you have already gotten uke to a position where you are "T-ed up" to him. That's OK as long as you understand the situation. If you have uke stand in a foot forwrd stance (Migi or hidari shizentai), then the angles change, and your body position (angle) relative to uke has to change as well. This is true for all throws.

The hopping thing you discovered on your own, which is great ! Another one to watch out for is backing out and "winding up" before doing the throw. This usually happens on a static uke, and is a consequence of wanting to build some momentum to enter the throw. That will slow you down a lot and you can't really do it under live conditions.

Try moving in different directions; sideways, circling towards your lapel hand, stuff like that. Most successful seoi otoshi I see (and did) involved movement, catching uke changing directions especially. Better players won't push on you much if at all, and if they do they are doing it deliberately for some reason. So lateral movement becomes very important.

Falling for Judo since 1980

"You are wrong. Why? Because you move like a pregnant yak and talk like a spazzing 'I train UFC' noob." -DCS

Oh yeah, the backing up and winding up stuff is super common... In fact, there's another nikkyu that started hanging out with us sambo guys who does that really, really badly. Just a bad habit from years and years of repetition with no one to tell him otherwise.

When we are doing throw-for-throw warm-ups, his throws are so fucking unbelievably scary... The first time we started moving around with each other, I was thinking "how the hell am I going to deal with this guy?", but then when we sparred, his throws just do not transfer to randori. I get him almost every time, and I am willing to bet that it has something to do with his backing out and winding up.

Oh yeah, the backing up and winding up stuff is super common... In fact, there's another nikkyu that started hanging out with us sambo guys who does that really, really badly. Just a bad habit from years and years of repetition with no one to tell him otherwise.

When we are doing throw-for-throw warm-ups, his throws are so fucking unbelievably scary... The first time we started moving around with each other, I was thinking "how the hell am I going to deal with this guy?", but then when we sparred, his throws just do not transfer to randori. I get him almost every time, and I am willing to bet that it has something to do with his backing out and winding up.

I've seen that plenty of times myself, still see it in videos on the 'net and in person.

The issue is too much static uchikomi, which is common.

I wouldn't say everyone who does uchikomi that way (windup) can't throw in randori or shiai though, LOL. Not in my experience at least.

Not only did no one tell him, his coaches probably though he looked pretty good doing them.

Falling for Judo since 1980

"You are wrong. Why? Because you move like a pregnant yak and talk like a spazzing 'I train UFC' noob." -DCS